Jimmy Page

James Patrick "Jimmy" Page, OBE (born 9 January1944) is an Englishguitarist, composer and record producer. He began his career as a studio session guitarist in London and was subsequently a member of The Yardbirds, from late 1966 to 1968, before founding the English rock band Led Zeppelin. Page has been described as "unquestionably one of the all-time most influential, important, and versatile guitarists and songwriters in rock history."[1]

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Page was born in the west London suburb of Heston, which today forms part of the London Borough of Hounslow. His father was an industrial personnel manager and his mother was a doctor's secretary. In 1952 they moved to Miles Road, Epsom. Jimmy Page first picked up the guitar when he was 12 years old and although he took a few lessons in nearby Kingston, was largely self-taught. Among his early influences were rockabilly guitarists Scotty Moore and James Burton, who both played on recordings made by Elvis Presley. The Presley song "Baby Let's Play House" was an early favourite on one of his first electric guitars, a second hand 1959 Futurama Grazioso.[citation needed] Page's musical tastes also encompassed acoustic folk playing, particularly that of Bert Jansch and John Renbourn, and the blues sounds of Elmore James and B.B. King. At the age of 14, Page appeared on Huw Wheldon's All Your Own talent quest programme in a skiffle trio, a popular English music genre of the time. One performance was televised[1]. Page said in an interview with Guitar Player magazine, "There was a lot of busking in the early days, but as I say, I had to come to grips with it, and it was a good schooling."[5]

Page would take a guitar to school each day and have it confiscated and handed back to him at 4.00 pm.[6] He was interested in science and had an interview for a job as a Laboratory Assistant, but he chose to leave school to pursue music instead [6] and after brief stints backing Beat poet Royston Ellis and singer Red E. Lewis, Page was asked by singer Neil Christian to join his band The Crusaders. Page toured with Christian for approximately two years and later played on several of his records, including the November 1962 single, "The Road to Love".
During his stint with Christian, Page fell seriously ill with glandular fever and couldn't continue touring. While recovering, Page decided to put his musical career on the shelf and concentrate on his other love, painting. He enrolled at Sutton Art College in Surrey.

When questioned about which songs he played on, especially ones where some controversy as to what his exact role was, Page often points out that it is hard to remember exactly what he did given the huge number of sessions he was playing at the time.[7]

Although Page recorded with many notable musicians, many of these early tracks are only available through bootlegged copies, several of which were released by the Led Zeppelin fan club in the late 1970s. The records released by the fan club include many otherwise unreleased live Led Zeppelin recordings. One of the rarest of these is the early jam session featuring Jimmy Page playing with Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, featuring a cover of "Little Queen of Spades" by the blues legend Robert Johnson.

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In late 1964 Page was approached about the possibility of replacing Eric Clapton in The Yardbirds, but he declined the offer out of loyalty to his friend. In February 1965 Clapton quit the Yardbirds, and Page was formally offered Clapton's spot, but because he was unwilling to give up his lucrative career as a session musician, and because he was still worried about his health under touring conditions, he suggested his friend, Jeff Beck, fill the position. On May 16, 1966, drummer Keith Moon, bass player John Paul Jones, keyboardist Nicky Hopkins, Jeff Beck and Page recorded "Beck's Bolero" in London's IBC Studios. The experience gave Page an idea to form a new supergroup featuring Beck, along with The Who's John Entwistle on bass and Keith Moon on drums, however the lack of a quality vocalist and contractual problems brought the project to a halt.

Within weeks, Page was again offered a spot in the Yardbirds and at first played bass guitar with the group after the departure of Paul Samwell-Smith, before finally switching to twin lead guitar with Beck when Chris Dreja moved to bass. The musical potential of the line-up however was scuttled by interpersonal conflicts caused by constant touring and a lack of commercial success, although they released one single, "Happenings Ten Years Time Ago". (While Page and Jeff Beck played together in The Yardbirds, the trio of Page, Beck and Eric Clapton never played in the original group all at the same time. The three guitarists did appear on stage together at the ARMS charity concerts in 1983.)

After Beck's departure, the Yardbirds remained a quartet. They recorded one album with Page on lead guitar, Little Games. The album received indifferent reviews and was not a commercial success, peaking at only number 80 on the Billboard Music Charts. Though their studio sound was fairly commercial at the time, the band's live performances were in total contrast with this, becoming heavier and more experimental. These concerts featured musical aspects that Page would later perfect with Led Zeppelin, most notably performances of Jake Holmes' version of "Dazed and Confused".

Despite the departure of Keith Relf and Jim McCarty in 1968, Page wished to continue the group with a new line-up to fulfill unfinished tour dates in Scandinavia. He recruited vocalist Robert Plant and drummer John Bonham, and was contacted by John Paul Jones who asked to join, to which Page agreed. During the Scandinavian tour the new group appeared as "The New Yardbirds", but Keith Moon, the drummer of The Who, suggested that Jimmy Page's new band would go over like a "Lead Zeppelin." Page stuck with that name to use for his new band. Peter Grant changed it to "Led Zeppelin," to avoid a mispronunciation of "Leed Zeppelin."

Page's past experiences both in the studio and with the Yardbirds were very influential in contributing to the success of Led Zeppelin in the 1970s. As a producer, composer, and guitarist he helped make Led Zeppelin a prototype for many future rock bands, and was one of the major driving forces behind the rock sound of that era, influencing a host of other guitarists. For example, his sped up, downstroke guitar riff in "Communication Breakdown" is cited as guitarist Johnny Ramone's inspiration for his punk-defining, strictly downstroke guitar strumming, while Page's landmark guitar solo from the song "Heartbreaker" has been credited by Eddie Van Halen as the inspiration for his two-hand tapping technique after he saw Led Zeppelin perform in 1972. Page's solo in the famous epic "Stairway to Heaven" has been voted by readers of various guitar magazines, including Guitar World and Total Guitar as the greatest guitar solo of all time, and he was named 'Guitarist of the Year' five years straight during the 1970s by Creem magazine.

Page is famous for playing his guitar with a cello bow, as on the songs "Dazed and Confused", "How Many More Times", "Kashmir", and in the interlude of "In the Evening". This was a technique he developed during his session days, although strictly speaking he was not the first guitarist to use a bow, since Eddie Phillips of The Creation had done so prior to Page.[7] On MTV's Led Zeppelin Rockumentary, Page said that he obtained the idea of playing the guitar with a bow from David McCallum, Sr. who was also a session musician. Page used his Fender Telecaster and later his Gibson Les Paul for his bow solos.

On a number of Led Zeppelin songs Page experimented with feedback devices and a theremin. He used a Wah-wah pedal but not always in the traditional way of rocking it back and forth as done by Jimi Hendrix and other contemporaries; instead, he put it fully forward in the treble position to get a sharper tone.

Page is credited for the innovations in sound recording he brought to the studio during the years he was a member of Led Zeppelin.[8] During the late 1960s, most British music producers placed microphones directly in front of amplifiers and drums, resulting in the sometimes "tinny" sound of the recordings of the era. Page commented to Guitar World magazine that he felt the drum sounds of the day in particular "sounded like cardboard boxes."[8] Instead, Page was a fan of 1950s recording techniques; Sun Studios being a particular favourite. In the same Guitar World interview, Page remarked, "Recording used to be a science," and "[engineers] used to have a maxim: distance equals depth." Taking this maxim to heart, Page developed the idea of placing an additional microphone some distance from the amplifier (as much as twenty feet) and then recording the balance between the two. By adopting this technique, Page became one of the first British producers to record a band's "ambient sound" - the distance of a note's time-lag from one end of the room to the other.

For the recording of several Led Zeppelin tracks, such as "Whole Lotta Love" and "You Shook Me", Page additionally utilised "reverse echo" - a technique which he is widely believed to have invented himself whilst with The Yardbirds (he had originally developed the method when recording the 1967 single "Ten Little Indians").[8] This production technique involved hearing the echo before the main sound instead of after it, achieved by turning the tape over and employing the echo on a spare track, then turning the tape back over again to get the echo preceding the signal.

Page has stated that, as producer, he deliberately changed the audio engineers on Led Zeppelin albums, from Glyn Johns for the first album, to Eddie Kramer for Led Zeppelin II, to Andy Johns for Led Zeppelin III and later albums. He explained that "I consciously kept changing engineers because I didn't want people to think that they were responsible for our sound. I wanted people to know it was us."[8]

Led Zeppelin disbanded in 1980 following the death of drummer John Bonham at Page's home, The Old Mill House at Clewer in Berkshire. Page made a successful return to the stage with the A.R.M.S. (Action Research for Multiple Sclerosis) charity series of concerts in 1983 which honoured Small Faces bass player Ronnie Lane, who suffered from the disease. A 1984 video of a London A.R.M.S. concert was released featuring two songs from Page's work on the Death Wish II soundtrack, featuring Steve Winwood on vocals, and an on stage jam of "Layla" reunited Page with Yardbirds guitarists Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton. The Madison Square Garden show featured vocals by future The Firm vocalist Paul Rodgers. During the tour Page looked extremely thin and frail. According to the book Hammer of the Gods, Page reportedly told friends that he'd just given up heroin after seven years of use.

The surviving members of Led Zeppelin re-formed in 1985 for the Live Aid concert with both Phil Collins and Tony Thompson filling drum duties. However, the band considered their performance to be sub-standard with Page going on stage heavily intoxicated and let down by a poorly-tuned Les Paul. They were one of the few Live Aid acts to refuse permission for their segment to be included in the 20th anniversary DVD release of the concert. In 1986, Page reunited temporarily with his Yardbirds bandmates to play on several tracks of the Box of Frogs album Strange Land. The band also re-formed for the Atlantic Records 40th Anniversary show on 14 May, 1988. Page, Plant and Jones, as well as John Bonham's son Jason Bonham closed the 12-hour show. The band have also played together at various private family functions.

Since 1990, Page has been heavily involved in remastering the entire Led Zeppelin back catalogue and is currently participating in various charity concerts and charity work, particularly the Action for Brazil's Children Trust (ABC Trust), founded by his wife Jimena Gomez-Paratcha in 1998. In the same year, Page played guitar for rap singer/producer Puff Daddy's song "Come with Me," which heavily samples Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" and was included in the soundtrack of Godzilla. The two later performed the song on Saturday Night Live. A live album and tour with The Black Crowes follow in 1999.
In 2001 he made an appearance on stage with Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst and Wes Scantlin of Puddle of Mudd at the MTV Europe Video Music Awards in Frankfurt, where they performed a version of Led Zeppelin's "Thank You".[9]

In November 2006, Led Zeppelin were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The television broadcasting of the event consisted of an introduction to the band by various famous admirers, a presentation of an award to Jimmy Page and then a short speech by the guitarist. After this, rock group Wolfmother played a tribute to Led Zeppelin, playing the song "Communication Breakdown".[12][13]

On 6 January2007, Page was featured at #19 on Channel 4's The Ultimate Hellraiser, a countdown of music's top 25 who "lived the rock 'n' roll lifestyle". The show's reason for featuring Page was almost exclusively attributed to the groupies who toured with Led Zeppelin. In addition, many of John Bonham's shenanigans (for example driving a motorcycle down a hotel corridor) were blamed on Page.

On 2 December2007, Contacmusic.com confirmed that Jimmy was "Too traumatised for Zeppelin reunion" until now. He states in the article, "After John Bonham's death I spent 15 years not even wanting to think about Led Zeppelin. But I also have difficulty thinking it's all over. Now at least one concert is planned and I'm incredibly happy about that,"

In 2006, Page attended the induction of Led Zeppelin to the UK Music Hall of Fame. During an interview for the BBC for said event, he expressed plans to record new material in 2007, saying "It's an album that I really need to get out of my system... there's a good album in there and it's ready to come out" and "Also there will be some Zeppelin things on the horizon".[citation needed]

Jimmy had an early relationship with singer/songwriter Jackie De Shannon who he worked with. While in Led Zeppelin he had a longterm partner from 1970 to 1983, the French model and artist, Charlotte Martin (also an ex-girlfriend of Eric Clapton). Jimmy called her 'my lady'.They were introduced by Roger & Heather Daltrey on his birthday, January 9 1970; when Zeppelin performed at the Royal Albert Hall in London. They had a daughter together, Scarlet Lilith Eleida Page, who was born on March 24 1971.Jimmy's photographic autobiography Jimmy Page By Jimmy Page (Genesis Publications) was published in 2010.Jackie De Shannon and Charlotte Martin are the only two love interests depicted in his book.

Jimmy was offically married to Patricia Ecker, from Metairie, Louisiana in 1986 and had a son, James Patrick Page Jr. on April 26 1988; they divorced on January 16 1995. His son now lives in London.

In 1994 on the Page/Plant tour Jimmy met Jimena Gomez-Paratcha of Argentinian descent but raised in San Francisco. They started The ABC Trust, a charity foundation for Brazilian kids on the streets, and it was for this charity work which Jimmy received the MBE. Together, they have 3 children: daughter Zofia-Jade (born 1997), son Ashen Josan (born 1999) and Jana (born 1995). Jimmy adopted Jana but she was from a previous relationship of Miss Paratcha. They split up in 2006.

On the road sometimes his name has been associated with several groupies, they were Miss Pamela of The GTOs, Catherine James, Lori Maddox, BeBe Buell, and Krissy Wood, ex-wife of Ronnie Wood.While those groupies claim their relationships with Jimmy,he once mentioned them "that's what they're there for." In addition,he said about Led Zep era 'we were all family men at heart' in several interviews including 'INDEPENDENT' and 'Guitar Magazine'.

His eldest daughter, Scarlet Page, is a talented and respected photographer.

Jimmy has owned many properties, usually near to water. Page's first home was The Boathouse at Pangbourne in Berkshire and this is where Led Zepplein was first formed when he invited Robert Plant to come and stay for a few days. In 1972 he bought, from Richard Harris, the home which William Burges designed for himself in London, The Tower House. "I had an interest going back to my teens in the pre-Raphaelite movement and the architecture of Burges," he said. "What a wonderful world to discover." The reputation of William Burges (1827-1881) rests on his extravagant designs and his contribution to the Gothic revival in architecture in the nineteenth century.[14]

He also bought Plumpton Place in Sussex which is a moated Arts and Crafts house. He and Charlotte with baby Scarlet lived there. From the mid 1970s to 2004 Jimmy owned 'The Mill House', Mill Lane, Windsor, UK - formerly the home of actor Michael Caine. Fellow Led Zeppelin band member John Bonham died at the house in 1980. It was difficult to sell and Jimmy continued to own it long after he no longer lived there.

He owned Sol Studios in Cookham, Berkshire.

From the early 1970s to well into the 1980s, Jimmy Page owned the Boleskine House, the former residence of occultist Aleister Crowley. Sections of Page's fantasy sequence in The Song Remains the Same were filmed at night on the mountain side directly behind Boleskine House.

When married to Patricia Jimmy owned a home in Florida and he and Jimena owned a home in Turners Hill, Sussex. Jimmy now divides his time between his London house, and another famous Arts and Crafts home he bought in 2007.

In the early 1970s, Jimmy Page owned an occult bookshop and publishing house, "The Equinox Booksellers and Publishers" in Kensington High Street, London, eventually closing it as the increasing success of Led Zeppelin resulted in his having insufficient time to devote to it. The company published a facsimile of Crowley's 1904 edition of The Goetia. The seriousness of Page's intent was demonstrated by the dust wrapper being printed on the notoriously fragile camel hair paper of the original.
What made people particularly curious about Page's connection with the occult was the appearance of four symbols on the jacket of Led Zeppelin's fourth album. It was generally accepted that the four symbols represented each member of the band. During tours and performances after the release of Led Zeppelin IV, he often had zodiac symbols embroidered on his clothes (referred to as his "Dragon Suit", it included the signs for Capricorn, Scorpio and Cancer which are Page's Sun, Ascendant and Moon signs, respectively) along with the so-called "ZoSo" symbol. This fueled the curiosity of many fans who went to great lengths to find out what the symbols meant. The source of the ZoSo symbol itself is no longer a mystery but the meaning of it still is; it originated in 'Ars Magica Arteficii' (1557) by J Cardan, an old alchemical grimoire, where it has been identified as a sigil consisting of zodiac signs. The sigil is reproduced in "Dictionary of Occult, Hermetic and Alchemical Sigils" by Fred Gettings, published in 1982 by Routledge & Kegan Paul (see here). It had previously been conjectured that the symbol was derived from various occult and mystical sources, most notably The Kabbalah, a stylised "666" from Aleister Crowley's Equinox publication or from Austin Osman Spare's "Zos Speaks"' but these are now considered to be probably incorrect. It has also been alleged that the symbol is merely a doodle that Page scribbled while on the telephone. Page will still not comment on the symbol's meaning.

The artwork inside the album cover of Led Zeppelin IV is from the traditional Rider/Waite Tarot card design for the card called "The Hermit". Page transforms into this character during his segment of the movie "The Song Remains the Same". Although much has been made of his occult conections there are many other enfluences woven through the work of Jimmy Page. He is known to be a collector of pre-raphaelite art and he has acknowledged that the William Holman Hunt painting called 'The Light Of The World' which depicts Jesus holding a lantern was also an inspiration for his hermit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Holman_Hunt

The artwork for the Swan Song Records label, which was a record label launched by Led Zeppelin on May 10, 1974, as a vehicle for the band to promote its own products. The Swan Song company logo, depicting a writhing winged man (sans genitalia) in the sky, was based on Evening: Fall of Day (1869) by painter William Rimmer, featuring a picture of the mythological Greek god of light and reason, Apollo, although often it is misinterpreted as the classical Greek hero Icarus, who flew too close to the Sun, or Lucifer, a fallen angel who was cast out of heaven and then became Satan.[15]

During the time of the PMRC hearing of the 1980s there were some accusations claiming the song "Stairway to Heaven" had satanic reverse-audio messages (known at the time as "backwards masking") in the verse that starts with the line 'If there's a bustle in your hedgerow'. Members of Led Zepplein have refuted this.

Page was commissioned to write the soundtrack music for the film Lucifer Rising by another occultist and Crowley admirer, underground movie director Kenneth Anger. Page even allowed Anger to film a portion of this movie in the basement of Tower House (Page's London residence). In the end Page produced 23 minutes of music which Anger felt were useless. Anger claimed Page took three years to deliver the music, and the final product was only 23 minutes of droning. On top of that, the director slammed the guitarist in the press by calling him a "dabbler" in the occult and an addict. Anger accused Page of "having an affair with the White Lady" and being too strung out on drugs to complete the project. Page countered claiming he had fulfilled all his obligations, even going so far as to lend Anger his own film editing equipment to help him finish the project. Page's music was dumped eventually and replaced by a version completed in 1980 from prison by Bobby Beausoleil, a Charles Manson family member and convicted murderer. Bootlegs of Page's soundtrack for the project exist and were highly prized by Page's fans until an album also titled "Lucifer Rising" was released by Boleskine House Records on June 19, 1987. The blue vinyl disc contains all 23 minutes of the soundtrack music that Page provided for the movie. The introduction to Led Zeppelin's song "In the Evening" is said to be taken from the unfinished soundtrack, most of which was recorded by running a guitar through a synthesiser.

Oh, everyone went over the top a few times. I know I did and, to be honest with you, I don't really remember much of what happened.[19]

”

In 1976, Page began to use heroin, a fact attributed to Richard Cole, who stated that Page (as well as himself) was taking the drug during the recording sessions of the album Presence in that year, and that Page admitted to him shortly afterwards that he was addicted to the drug.[20] He took up heavy smoking in the same year in attempts to curb cravings for his developing drug addiction.[citation needed]

By 1977, Page's heroin addiction was beginning to hamper his guitar playing performances as exhibited on a number of Led Zeppelin bootleg recordings from their 1977 tour of the United States.[21][1] By this time the guitarist had lost a noticeable amount of weight. His onstage appearance was not the only obvious change, his addiction caused Page to become so inward and isolated it altered the dynamic between him and Plant considerably.[22] During the recording sessions for In Through The Out Door in 1978, Page's diminished influence on the album (relative to bassist John Paul Jones) is partly attributed to his ongoing heroin addiction, which resulted in his absence from the studio for large periods of time.[23]

Page reportedly kicked his heroin habit in the early 1980s.[24] In a 1988 interview with Musician magazine, Page took offence when the interviewer noted that heroin had been associated with his name, and insisted that "I'm not an addict, thank you very much."

Clive Winston, a character in the PS2 and Xbox 360 game Guitar Hero II, wears clothes resembling Page's "Dragon Suit" used in Led Zeppelin's late 75 into 77 concerts as well as playing guitar solos with a violin bow when Star Power is activated, and also has dragons as the design on his guitar neck, in a tribute to Jimmy.

Also in Guitar Hero II, an achievement in the Xbox 360 version of the game is titled the "Page and Plant Award", given to two players who can hit 100% of the notes in cooperative mode.

Page is mentioned in the Paul McCartney and Wings' song "Rock Show" with the line: "What's that man movin' 'cross the stage? It looks a lot like the one used by Jimmy Page. It's like a relic from a different age. Could be...Oo-Ee..."

The song Rock City by Damn Yankees states 'everybody jammin' with somewhere to play/ they wore their guitars low just like Jimmy Page'.

Page is also mentioned in the Everclear song "A.M. Radio" with the line: "I remember 1977 / I started going to concerts and I saw the Led Zeppelin / I gotta guitar Christmas Day / I prayed that Jimmy Page would come to Santa Monica and teach me to play"

Jimmy is mentioned in the song "The New Style" by US hip-hop group The Beastie Boys, with the line: "If I played guitar I'd be Jimmy Page, the girlies I like are underage." The second half of the couplet is perhaps an acknowledgement of Page's relationship with Lori Maddox, a fourteen-year-old groupie at the time she met Page, who was 28 himself.

Musician Ryan Adams mentions Jimmy Page in most of his live concerts. Ex. During the song "Cherry Lane", rather than saying "am I missing a page?" he says, "Where the fuck is Jimmy Page?"

Page is mentioned by surname in the Neil Young song "Downtown" from his album Mirror Ball, in the lyrics: "...Led Zeppelin on stage / there's a mirrorball twirlin' / and a note from Page..."

Page is mentioned in the song "I Hate Jimmy Page" from the Mindless Self Indulgence album Frankenstein Girls Will Seem Strangely Sexy with the line: "I hate Jimmy Page // Kick those faggots off the stage"

1958 Fender Telecaster (given to Page by Jeff Beck and repainted with a psychedelic Dragon on it by Page. Played with the Yardbirds, on Led Zeppelin I, the early tours (68-69), and on the studio version of Stairway to Heaven.

Another Gibson doubleneck guitar was given to him after he agreed to allow the company to reproduce his original EDS-1275. The guitar was picked by Page out of numerous others after he struck one chord. Page declared "This is it, this is the one!" The guitar was marked (beforehand) #1.

2007 Gibson Black Beauty custom (remake of his original stolen in 1970, has modifications concerning pickup configurations which include a 6-way pickup selector, and coil-tap on the bridge pickup)

Jimmy Page is reputed to own in excess of 1500 different guitars. Page revealed this rough estimate to BBC Radio Two presenter Stuart Maconie in June 2005.

Due to the fact the guitar was too heavy for him, one of Jimmy Page's Les Paul Custom "Black Beauty" is now owned by Dan Hawkins of The Darkness.[28] It is not the same Black Beauty that was stolen from him in 1970. Page recieved the first of both the 500 series and first of the 25 signed. He still owns the JPC001 the second one made by Gibson was a stoptail version that was the JPC002 owned by blues guitarist Rick Fagan in the USA. There were only 25 stoptails made.

Gibson released Jimmy Page Signature Les Paul which was discontinued in 1999, but released another version several years later and is still produced today. The Jimmy Page Signature EDS-1275 has been produced by Gibson. Recently, Gibson reproduced Page's 1960 Les Paul Black Beauty, the one stolen from him in 1970, with modern modifications. It is rumored that the Gibson Custom Shop will sell a limited edition of these Les Paul Customs sometime in 2008.

In July 2007 Page gave testimony and observed evidence on behalf of Led Zeppelin at a court case in Glasgow against an alleged boot-legger. Robert Langley was charged with, and denied, 12 counts of producing and selling products without copyright permission.[29] Page was shown hundreds of CDs and DVDs, ranging from his solo material to his time in Led Zeppelin and The Yardbirds, which Langley was allegedly selling in Scotland during 2005. Many contain footage and audio from Page's personal collection, stolen from his home in the early 1980s.[30]

The goods were found on sale as far away as New York, where shop-owners thought they were official. Page later said "If you have something like this that appears legitimate then it is just not right". Page concluded his day in court by greeting waiting fans and signing autographs.[30]